


Hollow Man

by xtricks



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Ghost Rider - Fandom, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Case Fic, Director Daisy Johnson, Gen, Long, Mostly Canon Compliant, Post-Season/Series 05 Finale, slightly AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2019-02-07
Packaged: 2019-06-07 07:49:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15214505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xtricks/pseuds/xtricks
Summary: Someone else noticed what happened in the alley.





	1. Prologue

Daisy had access to Coulson’s office now - all of it and everything it meant. She was taking advantage of that privilege by hiding in it. She hurt all over, especially the sharp miserable pain radiating from her neck all the way down her left arm to end in pins and needles and bonus dizziness if she moved to fast. There was no reason, it’d been a couple of weeks since Talbot, since any fighting at all, but maybe that was the reason. For months, she’d - they all - had done nothing but fight for their lives.

She’d been able to hide the pain, made easier by the fact that ... well, the world was ending and fear monsters were invading the lighthouse and everyone was fighting, and aliens were invading and one thing and another then another and _another_. They saved the world but she was too tired to feel it. And Coulson was gone.

Even thinking it made Daisy start to shake again, tears burning her tired eyes. She felt guilty crying about that, when so many awful things had happened, and didn’t he deserve a chance to be happy? He’d given his life to SHIELD, twice. He had the right to chose the way his life ended, after having that stolen from him once.

_“I’ve had five years of a second like. A wonderful life, an amazing one. And I’m okay with being done. It’s time to move on and you’re ready. You’re ready, Daisy.”_

_“I'm not ready,”_ she’d begged. But he’d gone anyway, with May, and everything was in her hands now.

They hadn’t left her any secret solutions. SHIELD was on the brink of crumbling into nothing and the things SHIELD was created to defend against were more numerous than ever before. Her consolation prize? Colson had left _her_ in charge.

“And here I thought you liked me,” Daisy whispered, throat too tight to laugh at her own lame joke and no one else to hear it. Letting her head thunk against the wall, she eyed Coulson’s cluttered office. His kingdom was hers and she had to figure out what to do with it.

_Was SHIELD even worth saving?_ It was an awful thought, when so many had given so much for it to survive.  But so many had lost so much because of it, too.  So much of what they’d done lately had been solving problems they’d created. It seemed like everyone she trusted had betrayed her, or died, or left, or went mad and tried to destroy the world. She pressed her hand to the nape of her neck and winced in pain. Maybe it would be better if SHIELD didn’t exist at all. For real.

Her phone buzzed, rattling on the floor where she’d set it instead of sitting on it and butt dialing someone. It was Jemma, her icon blinking insistently. Daisy was tempted to let her go to message but pressed speaker at the last minute. “What?”

“Um,” Jemma sounded tentative and raspy and Daisy knew she’d been crying too. “I know - busy and all - “

Daisy hugged her knees, rubbing her teary face against them. Jemma had asked her to keep the Doctor secret from Fitz.

_Just for a little while,_ she promised, _until they all had a little breathing room and time._

Daisy had agreed, mostly ‘cause she desperately didn’t want to talk about any of it. Ever.   Which made her not want to talk to Jemma, to be honest.  “Yup, real busy, so what do you want?”

“We received a report from one of SHIELDs remaining contacts and it’s probably something we should look into?”

Daisy locked away her tears and her uncertainty. “Well, the world isn’t ending so I guess we should get back to work.”


	2. Chapter 1

The Brooklyn hospital was one of the worst in the country, overcrowded, underfunded, full of poverty and pain and misery, but that didn’t explain what they were looking at right now.  Nothing did, really and that's why SHIELD had been called in - under the radar, of course.  Daisy had barely begun reaching out to their old government contacts and everyone was a little ... leery since she'd very publicly shot Talbot into space. 

“ _Uhg_ ,” Daisy clapped a hand to her nose, not that it did much. She’d already got a good whiff of the air; a rank dry smell somewhere between rot and burnt flesh. The smell of cleaners and the underlying whiff of illness that all hospitals carried just made it worse. Horrible. The sight wasn’t much better.

“He should be dead,” Jemma was fascinated already, digging equipment out of her shoulder bag. “I mean there’s not much there to still be alive!”

‘He’ was a ... well, looked more like a corpse than a living person. Bones wrapped in leathery flesh, lips drawn back to reveal yellowed teeth, sunken eyes and a bandage over what the records claimed was a partially healed bullet hole in his head. And a head of incongruous blond hair. Some remarkably talented nurse had managed to get an IV line into one withered arm, and most of the rest of the ... victim was bandaged. His chest heaved, drawing in a spasmodic gulp of air, then a whistling exhale. Daisy could hear bones creaking.

She took a sudden, terrified step back, dragging Jemma with her. “That’s not - it’s not Hive is it?”

Jemma’s fear was monetary but no less intense, her face going pale and eyes wide. But she shook her head almost immediately. “No, it would have moved on already. This is something else. Let me get some samples.”

“Make it quick,” Daisy left Jemma to do her thing and went to search the cabinet by the bed for personal effects. She found a stack of clothes; ratty jeans, heavy motorcycle boots, a leather jacket. No ID but a wad of cash in a skull and crossbones money clip. “New spin-off: Mummies of Anarchy.”

Jemma hummed agreeably, paying no attention, and Daisy fidgeted restlessly. Scrubs and hacked RFID chips had gotten them into the hospital but Daisy didn’t want to risk running into actual doctors attempting actual treatment. Her face was more popular than she liked. “We just need to rule out anything alien or enhanced -”

“I know, the usual.” Jemma said cheerfully as she scraped bits of dried skin off into tubes and siphoned off a few tubes of blood from the IV. Daisy made a face. “And - done! We can go - oh, medical records? We should get those, really.”

“Already done,” Daisy toed the door open and glanced out before putting on her ‘business casual’ walk and heading towards the exit with Jemma in tow. “Gotta love electronic records systems. They’ll be downloaded by the time we get back to the zephyr.”

They were back in the zephyr within two hours and hopefully it would be one of those one missions chalked up as ‘weird but harmless’, like Baskin Robbins 32nd’ flavor, or kids who could stick spoons to their skin. Daisy crossed her fingers hoping she hadn’t jinxed herself but she wasn’t surprised that when they got back to find everyone crowded around one of the security monitors with looks that told her this wasn’t going to be a one-and-done.

Mack looked especially unhappy. “I think things are gonna get weird.”

“So, just another day, huh?” Daisy nudged Elena a bit with her hip so she could join the crowd. The dead swing of Elena’s hands, which worked just fine when she thought of them, was still disconcerting - but at least she had them. And Mack was working on a better set. With Fitz. Daisy rubbed her tingling hand and reminded herself that this Fitz wasn’t that Fitz. She smiled unconvincingly at him; fake it ‘till she made it.

“So,” Piper keyed up some video, ignoring the nervous looks and awkward pauses. Daisy knew it was an act, she’d overheard Piper and Davis talking once but they seemed to have decided that discretion was the way to go. “We found some surveillance video from the bodega on the corner and the back door to the bar.”

“The bar was monitoring their garbage bins, I don’t know why,” Elena piped up. “But handy for us.”

Piper shrugged. “The hospital records indicated they’d picked up our ... uh, subject here ....”

It was easy to recognize their mummy, though he looked nothing like it now - Daisy had seen the motorcycle jacket and shaggy blond hair under very different circumstances. He left the bodega with beer and cheap tacos, headed down the alley where a gorgeous classic motorcycle waited and -

“What’s _that?”_ Jemma’s gaze was avid with curiosity.

Everything looked fine, as their mystery man swaggered along, until an abrupt gold light lit up the dirty pavement and made the video feed on the cameras flare at the contrast. Weird lines and tangled luminescent knots spread along the ground, sparking like fireworks and spreading in concentric circles around the biker. Like an animal in a trap, he bolted for freedom, but hit some invisible wall at the edge of the pattern. The biker’s sleeves began to smoke, fire gleaming in his eyes, scorching his hair, and Daisy slapped a shocked palm to her mouth.

“Ohmygod, he’s - “

The biker burst into flame, skin crumbling to reveal a fiery skull and the Rider - a Rider? - whipped a chain from around his waist, screaming in silent rage at some unseen target. The glowing lines held the Rider as thoroughly as they had the man, though it threw itself furiously against the barrier, punching, burning, trying to swipe it’s chain across the invisible.

“Quantum disconnect, maybe?” Fitz was murmuring with Jemma humming her own interest beside him. “Guided by whatever ... lasers, they have to be....”

“Or an electrical current, they could lay down a conductive pattern and charge it when ....”

Listening to Fitz and Jemma’s murmured theories was so familiar it broke Daisy’s heart and made her arm ache with the bitter awareness that nothing was the same, no matter how it sounded.

“And next,” Mack said. “Here’s the interesting and weird part. Weirder part. The very weird part.”

“It’s not weird _now?”_ Daisy asked.

Someone stepped into view, mostly a profile which would thwart SHIELD’s facial recognition programs. The Rider’s pointless attacks redoubled. It made Daisy sick to see and she couldn’t help imagining Robbie there instead. Was this Robbie’s Rider, somehow transferred to a stranger? She hadn’t tried to reach out to Robbie since they’d defeated Talbot, too busy ... too afraid. She didn’t want to know that he’d never returned from wherever he’d gone. She already hurt too much. It was better to just imagine that he was home, safe, and taking care of his brother.

The newcomer set down a box right at the edge of the outermost circle, activating a touchpad on the top with the bland, business like boredom of an underpaid IT guy, then stepped back. The Rider stalked the boundary of it’s trap like a predator. Nothing seemed to happen, except Daisy frowned at the box, tickled by a faint memory. It looked familiar. Then the Rider exploded into a mad attempt to get away from the box with such frenzied violence that everyone watching jumped, even those who’d seen it before. If a demon with a burning skull for a head could look afraid, this Rider did.

It’s fire burned higher, bound only by the luminous circles on the ground, rising into the night until the figure of the Rider itself was just a dark shadow in the center of raging flames. Then, that unnatural fire was pulled - _dragged_ \- towards the box, until, abruptly, the box slammed shut. The biker collapsed onto the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, ignored by his attacker as the man picked up the box and walked off. The webwork of lines guttered out.

“We have to go there,” Fitz said immediately. “See what that trap was made of, how it works - what it did - “

Everyone was looking at her and ... Daisy remembered that _she_ was Director now, she was the one to lay out the plan, make the next steps. “Yeah, you and Simmons take a look. Piper go with, okay? And, um ... that box. The box the IT thug had, I’ve seen it before - we’ve all seen it. From Eli Morrow and Robbie? That’s a funny coincidence, huh?” By which she meant, probably not coincidence at all.

Mack rocked back. “Yeah, those boxes, which were in the Playground. So how’d they - whoever they are - get it? It was pretty thoroughly blown up.”

“Not blown up enough, I guess.” Daisy shrugged, then bit her tongue to hide a wince as a spasm ran up her arm. “Take a quinjet, take a look, and find out who stole the stuff we stole.” She sighed. “And I’ve got a house call to make.”


	3. Chapter 3

It had taken a little shuffling to get to LA and from there, Daisy ... called Uber.  Now she was loitering outside Canelo’s, sweating in the sun. She saw why Robbie worked there - aside from needing the money - in just the short time she’d been sitting on a bus bench halfway down the block she’d seen some pretty shady folks come by to get their cars ‘fixed’ - one from what had to be bullet holes.  Must give him plenty of chances to find folks to lay down some vengeance on.

Robbie, in his shabby coveralls, was changing the oil on some beater in one of the outside bays, and the relief Daisy felt at the sight of him made her sit her butt down with her melting frappuccino and wonder  _ why _ .  They got on sure - when they weren’t trying to kill each other - but barely knew each other.  He was hot (and, yeah,  _ hot _ ) but Daisy was putting that part of her dumpster fire life on hold for now.  That has been her directorial resolution; no boyfriends, no girlfriends, no friends with benefits - no heartbreak, no dead, treacherous lovers to haunt her nights.  She was Daisy All-Business Johnson, Director of SHIELD.

“You missed your bus.”    


_ “Fuck!”  _ Daisy jumped and kicked over her drink and wow, wasn’t she cool now.  “Don’t  _ do  _ that, Robbie.”

Robbie’s smile was barely there, more around his eyes than his mouth, but Daisy caught the humor as he sat down next to her, wiping his hands on a rag.  He was sweaty and filthy and smelled like exhaust but it was nice to see him. He looked deceptively normal.

“Are you okay?” Daisy blurted, thinking of the video she’d watched a few hours ago.

Robbie grunted in surprise.  “I was gonna ask the same thing.  I tried to reach you when I ... got back,” his expression stilled for a moment before he went on.  “But I couldn’t.”

“We weren’t in range.”  _ That  _ was an understatement.  Daisy toed the sticky puddle coffee flavored sugar at their feet, avoiding Robbie’s eyes and remembering again why she'd put off reaching out to him.  “I know I said I’d look out for Gabe ... I’m sorry but we -”

“Hey,” Robbie’s voice was gruff and he leaned over until his face was in Daisy’s view despite her efforts.  “I saw the news from Chicago.” 

He shrugged, brows drawing down in familiar guilt.  “I had a little cash set by in case, y’know, I didn’t show up one morning after my night job.  Gabe took care of himself.” He sounded surprised, and grudgingly pleased, about it. “You here about that?”

“No,” Daisy admitted, fishing out her tablet and glad to change the subject.  “This. I saw this and pretty much thought of you.”

“Huh,” Robbie’s sidelong smirk faded as into shock as he watched the security footage; the appearance of the Rider, the trap, the box, all of it.  “He’s the one who brought me back from the dead. Made me the Ghost Rider,” he said numbly. “The devil.”

“Well, he’s in a New York hospital looking like a few thousand years of bad road,” Daisy said.  She pulled up the section where the Rider was sucked into the box. “You still have ..?”

“The devil inside?  I guess there’s more than one, ‘cause I still got mine.”

“You guess? You don’t  _ know?” _

“No, I don’t know.” Robbie scowled at her then snatched the tablet to watch the footage again, getting up to pace restlessly.  “Someone forgot to give me the manual.”

“Does the ... Rider tell you things?  Like, how to do - what you do?” When Robbie handed the tablet back, she had to to a little subtle juggling a little to keep it from slipping out of her weak hand.  “Does he  _ talk?” _

Robbie sat back down.  “The first time I heard it  _ talk  _ was when it was in Mack and, man, that was creepy.  It’s always there,” he gave an uneasy shrug. “Watching, and - fuck it’s hard to explain - it sort of tells me things but really only about, y’know, who deserves to suffer.  Who deserves to die. Who’s guilty. Not with words but ... just,  _ knowing _ .”

“After all my traveling.” he finished quietly.  “It’s sometimes it’s hard to tell who’s who.”

His sidelong glance to Daisy was so familiar, full of self-doubt, a flicker of real fear, and the terrible questions Daisy knew too well.   _ Who am I?  What am I? What have I become? _

She’d fought so hard against what might have been - the Destroyer of Worlds - now there was no prophecy, no desperate struggle to escape a horrible future, and she  _ still  _ had the same questions Robbie did.  What was she now? After Talbot and the centipede serum.  What would she  _ become _ ?

“Hey,” this time she was the one to lean down to catch his eyes.  “You came back right? To Gabe, you came  _ home _ .  The Rider wouldn’t care.  So, you know - it’s you.”

Robbie half shook his head, half smiled as if he couldn’t decide if he agreed or disagreed.  “This guy, you said he’s still alive? I want to see him.”

“I was kinda hoping you’d say that,” Daisy said.  Thank god, she wouldn’t have to try and convince him.  “When can you leave?”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone else noticed what happened in the alley.

Everything kinda sucked but Piper knew her level of suckitude was pretty low compared to everyone else.  So, she was big on the shut the fuck up and soldier, soldier. Especially right now, playing third fiddle to Fitz and Simmons.  Everyone was walking on eggshells around those two, like they would fall apart at the wrong word, or a stray breeze.

Jemma’s white knuckled grip on her gear made Piper wonder if it would even take that much.  According to Davis, and he always knew the scuttlebut, Simmons had asked everyone to not tell  _ this  _ Fitz what the  _ old  _ Fitz had done; the torture, the repurposed robots ... not even the wedding.  She’d asked Piper along with everyone else, practically  _ pleading  _ with her to understand;  _ she didn’t want to put any pressure on him, or - or expectations. _ Jemma wasn’t good at hiding herself and the way she said  _ expectations  _ broke Piper’s heart.  

No one was calling them ‘FitzSimmons’ anymore.

New York was everything she remembered; crowded, smelly, too hot, and full of crannies, shadows, and blind corners. She wished she had something better than a little ICER and her paranoia.  The one thing she’d learned in SHIELD, besides big guns, was never believe you were safe. Oh, and Hydra never died. Dammit. 

No one was following them and nobody was likely to recognize the three of them on the street like this.  They weren’t famous like Daisy ‘Quake’ Johnson, viglinate and savior of the world (or terrorist, depending on who you asked).  Chicago still had chunks of alien spaceship all over downtown and the news was full of footage of Daisy and Talbot fighting, and some of SHIELD’s rescue efforts in the aftermath.  But the government still wasn’t entirely sure that it believed Daisy had  _ really  _ saved the world (and the news like to show that iphone capture of Talbot shooting off into the sky way to often for Piper’s taste).  Daisy’s efforts to get back into the government’s good graces was going slowly. But the three of them could walk down the street without worrying about selfies or the police.  They were just strangers amid thousands of others. It was a kind of freedom, no one looking to kill them, the weight of the world no longer hanging over their heads. It was a nice change.

Jemma was trying some small talk, about the city, from what Piper could overhear.  Fitz wasn’t having any of it.

“Maybe we can stop at Central Park after we’re done, it’s supposed to be  _ amazing  _ this time of year.  The leaves ... the colors ....”  Jemma sounded brittle, even to Piper, and how she thought Fitz didn’t notice, or care, was beyond her.

“It’s just everything dying,” Fitz’s hands were full of equipment, with only a glance at Jemma as she spoke and he stretched his legs as if to get away from the conversation.  “Same as always.”

“Not really,” Jemma had to hurry to catch up and Piper silently brought up the rear.  “The trees aren’t dying, they’re just -”

“Cutting their losses.”

“It’s not really any different than losing hair or skin cells.  We don’t call  _ that  _ dying.”

Fitz’s voice rose a bit, his gaze too, as if reaching for the same familiarity Jemma was struggling for.  “Depends on who you ask. There are billion dollar industries keeping hair on men’s heads.”

Jemma rolled her eyes.  “Wrinkles and grey hair mean a life lived.  I don’t see any reason to hide it.” It was the wrong thing and everyone knew it as soon as the words left Jemma’s mouth.

“No?”  Fitz’s voice sharpened.  “I wonder about that -”   


Piper winced.  Fitz deserved answers but not  _ here _ .  Not in the middle of a street, not in the middle of a field op.  “Hey - that’s the bodega, right? That must be the alley.”

Like every alley she’d ever seen, there was a sketchy looking guy holding up the graffiti strewn wall next to it, with a little pile of cigarette stubs at his feet like he’d been propping up the wall for while.  This one was blonde, scruffy, and wearing a wrinkled trench coat like he’d rolled out of bed ten minutes ago, and maybe fell on the floor a couple of times too. “I’ll go move him on,” Piper volunteered. “Give me a minute.”

“The bar’s that way,” Piper said, hooking a thumb over her shoulder as she sauntered up.  This was New York, there’d be a bar any direction, eventually. “How about you go find it?”

The bum’s brows rose and he lit a fresh a cigarette with the stub of his old, sparks cascading up between them in a twist of confusing smoke, and his smirk was abruptly familiar.  “Sorry, luv.”

“I’m not your  _ luv  _ ....”  Piper waved smoke out of her eyes, blinking at the sting, and,  _ right _ , he was ... he was the new guy.  She’d forgotten his name, dammit. “Y’know those things will kill you.  Agent ..?”

He laughed, attention flicking from Piper to Fitz then Jemma, sharp and measuring. He might be one of theirs but he really needed to clean up his act - you couldn’t smoke in places like the zephyr ....  Piper’s brows drew down, now that she thought of it, she didn’t recall seeing him in the zephyr, or the Lighthouse and ... when had he come on board anyway? Recently. Right.

“Agent - now that’s a new one.  Agent  _ Constantine _ .”

“Yeah,” Piper’s fingers twitched with a disconnected urge to reach for her gun.  But Constantine’s quirked brow and  _ slightly  _ smug smirk reminded her that maybe she was being a little too paranoid.  Justifiably, considering everything over the last few months, but her unease was smothered under Constantine’s intense gaze, and the smell of his cigarettes, as his smirk faded into something that could be regret.

“We’d best get to ... agenting, yeah?”

Piper waved Fitz and Simmons over, tilting her chin towards the alley.  It was late fall in New York and it stank like rotting barbeque. Piper grimaced and hoped that was normal alley stench and not something to do with their case.  “We’re good to go. Lemme take point.”

“Are you sure?” Jemma asked brow furrowed, then she gave Constantine an apologetic smile, recognition coming slowly.  “Oh, right.  _ Right _ .  Hi.  SHIELD is a no smoking organization.”   She wrinkled her nose. 

“Except that time when you set the lab on fire.” Piper said because if she wanted everyone to avoid conversational potholes maybe she’d better steer the conversation.  

“That was just the once,” Jemma said.

“Twice,” Fitz murmured, though his heart clearly wasn’t in it.  “And blew it up.”

“That was  _ definitely  _ only once.”

Constantine snorted.  “Sounds like my kinda place.”

“What’s that mean?” Fitz was glaring mulishly at his equipment, fidgeting with some of the sensor’s settings on a genuinely weird looking headset.  He’d taken one look at Constantine and busied himself with his equipment like he couldn't stand to look at the man. “Just get rid of it, that smoke is everywhere.  New York is bad enough.”

“Sorry.” Constantine flicked the tail end of his cigarette, orange sparks spilling hypnotically down and catching everyone’s eyes before he stomped it out.  “Have my share of filthy habits.”

“Be careful,” Fitz’s attention was darting rapidly from Piper to Jemma, then to Constantine and he looked ... weird.  Despairing? Desperate? Whatever it was, it made Piper’s shoulders hunch nervously, wondering - and she knew they’d always be wondering with him now - if the  _ Doctor  _ was making an appearance.  “No telling if that trap is still active or if those operatives are still around.  They could be even be waiting to see who came to investigate. Especially if it’s equipment stolen from -” he cut himself off abruptly.   


“Oh, I’d bet they’ve moved on,” Constantine said after a curious look at Fitz, waving his hand and wandering into the alley with a casualness that made Piper sigh.   _ Never  _ doubt the science twins.  But nothing blew up. Or burst into flame.  “But, might be a clue or two left for the sharp eye.”

She swept the shadows, palm against her holstered ICER but maybe Constantine’s presence had scared any other bums away. He was idling in the background, hands shoved in his pockets.  How did he wear that coat in the heat anyway? He gave her a charming smile, and Piper sighed, already anticipating Daisy falling for him. She always went for the hard luck cases.

“The bike’s still here,” Jemma said in surprise as she and Fitz brought up the rear.  “I would imagine they’d impound it. Even in New York a mummy in an alley would be a bit out of the norm.  Maybe there’s some ID on it, a name ....”

Jemma was right, impossible as it should be in a city like New York.  The motorcycle was still parked in the alley, just where their mystery man had left it almost a week ago.  But not  _ quite  _ the same.

“Someone did  _ something  _ to it.”  Piper said a little mournfully.  The motorcycle in the security footage had been pristine, perfect - a rich, glossy black and unblemished chrome - with backswept handlebars and a not at all subtle flame details anywhere there was room.  The bike they were looking at right now ... it was a bike only because there were wheels and a handlebar. Not too closely attached.

“Did someone  _ crush  _ it?” Jemma asked.

“Considering how much a 1972 Harley is  _ worth _ , that’d be pretty stupid.” Piper said.

“You sound like Mack,” Jemma replied.

Piper laughed, though she still had her eyes on the shadows.  “He’d be in tears if he saw this.”

The bike was pretty much trashed.  The frame was bent, handlebars twisted, seat cracked and torn, the black paint job scuffed ... there wasn’t an inch of the bike left intact.  Oil leaked from somewhere to pool on the asphalt, red as blood in the lights from the alley. 

“The damage isn’t consistent with crushing.” Fitz said.  “And -  _ don’t  _ step there.  That’s where the circles were that trapped the ... uh, Devil Rider.”  Piper leapt back back from the scorched circle in the dirty asphalt. It was already scuffed and strewn with trash, with no sign of activity.  Nothing rose up and burned her to ash.

“Yay,” Piper mumbled.  Celebrate the little victories.  Behind her, Fitz was asking Jemma for her bag because he’d forgotten his gloves and Piper glanced over her shoulder with a frown.  Fitz didn’t forget things usually, except occasionally words, and she  _ seen  _ gloves this morning and he was dipping his hand into Jemma’s bag and pulling out her  _ ICER -  _

“Fitz, no!” Piper yelled, clawing her own pistol out in a panic as Jemma lunged, just too late, to grab her own gun back. 

“Put it down!” Jemma cried.  “Fitz, please ... you’re not thinking!  What are you  _ doing _ ?”

_ “He’s not one of us!” _ Fitz yelled, gun aimed at Constantine.  “I don’t know what he’s done to you but he’s not an agent, he’s  _ not  _ SHIELD!  Who  _ are  _ you?  What have you done to my friends?”

Piper knew she only had a split second.  Was that Fitz or the Doctor? “ _ Stop _ , Fitz!”

“Bugger me,” Constantine grumbled, not at all like a man with a gun pointed at him, raising his hands -

\- and Fitz pulled the trigger, Piper and Jemma yelling in tandem as the ICER bullet hit Constantine square in the forehead.  Piper pulled her trigger on instinct - who would Fitz target next? Both men went down, twitching with the effects of the ICER guns Fitz himself had invented.

Jemma flung herself down beside both men, hands hovering for a moment as if unsure who to check first.  Right then, gun still humming in her hand, Piper looked down at the three of them and realized she  _ didn’t  _ recognize Constantine.  He wasn’t a new agent, he wasn’t SHIELD, wasn’t anyone she knew or had even seen before and Fitz had been  _ right _ .  And she’d shot him.

“Oh, god.” Piper gasped, horrified.  The she fucking soldiered and tabbed her radio on, fumbling her pistol back into her holster and a set of zip cuffs out.  “Fuck -  _ Davis _ , we need immediate evac.  Where’s the closest spot for a pick-up?”

_ “ - on my way,” _ Davis, thank god, didn’t waste time asking what was going on.   _ “There’s a rooftop lot two blocks over if you can get there.  I’ll be three minutes out.” _

“We’ll get there,” Piper promised, rolling Constantine - if that was his name - over and zipping his wrists together.  Whoever he was, he was going to get more than he’d bargained for, pretending to be SHIELD. A flat little disk dropped out of his hand, making Piper flinch, but it did nothing and - using a sample baggie from Jemma’s spilled kit - she picked it up for later.

“He’s okay,” Jemma said, resting a hand on Fitz’s chest. “They’re both okay.  And - he was trying to help us, he was doing his  _ job  _ and we - “

“Not now,” Piper said and Jemma nodded sharply. “You stay here, I’m going to go steal a car.”

It took her a few minutes, with Davis updating her - repeatedly - that he was on site and ready and there was only so long before someone tried to park their car where an invisible jet was sitting.  When she got back, a shitty toyota in hand, Jemma was standing next to the wrecked cycle, shaking her hand and hissing under her breath. The bike was  _ smoking _ .

“What happened?” Piper asked, giving Constantine a wild glance, but he was still out cold.  “Jemma -?”

“It’s nothing,” Jemma said in exasperation, flexing her fingers once before hurrying back to Piper’s side.  “I tried to get that saddlebag in case there was useful information but the bike suddenly went  _ hot  _ \- burned my hand a little, that’s all.”

“I - we have to get out of here.  Can you use it? We have to move them,” Piper asked and was relieved, and unsurprised, when Jemma nodded and bent to help her.  Piper had been quiet witness to so much of the team, she knew a couple of blisters weren’t going to stop Jemma.  They hauled Constantine out where she’d illegally pulled the car up onto the sidewalk just outside the alley. They got him in the car without anyone interfering (thank god for New York’s callousness) but a good samaritan did come up when they were piling Fitz - with more care than Constantine had received - into the back.

“ - I  _ know _ ,” Jemma was playing up her wide-eyed look, and English accent, to the hilt.  “It’s ridiculous, my brother never learns, and gets into these dumb contests with everyone.  Last time it was eating cinnamon - you know it’s highly hydrophobic? It isn’t possible to swallow it and of course I told him the dolt -”

Piper got Fitz into the car and slammed the door and climbed into the driver’s seat.  “We’re good to go.”

“So,” Jemma was sidling away from the older couple with an apologetic smile. “We’re taking them both to urgent care.  That seems like a good idea doesn’t it?”

That seemed to mollify the couple long enough for Jemma to hop in the car and for them to make a getaway.  Piper saw the good samaritans taking cell phone pictures of the license plate and sent a mental apology to whoever she’d stolen the car from.

“It was a lot easier when we had a giant international agency for back-up,” Jemma said, then paused.  “Even if they were mostly Hydra.”

“Those were the good old days,” Pipper murmured and Jemma snorted back a laugh.

They were the ones to nearly run into the quinjet, Piper slammed on the breaks with Davis yelling in her ear at the last minute.  He turned off the stealth long enough for them to get everyone on board and was taking off even as Piper made her way to the co-pilot seat.

“Everything went as usual?” He said tapping into the local air com channels to make sure they weren’t seen or going to crash into a copter that couldn’t see them.

“If by usual you mean totally pear shaped?”  Piper buckled in, acknowledging Jemma’s immediate com demand that they get back to the zephyr right away in one ear and taking over the coms duty from Davis with the other.

“Yeah, that sounds about like the usual.”


	5. Chapter 5

Robbie couldn’t just up and  _ go _ .  First there was his boss, and the fact he’d been back at work for less than a month. Then Gabe.  

He gave Daisy an awkward, pleading glance and she wordlessly peeled off to hang in his yard while he went to talk to his brother.  Gabe had opinions and was fine with sharing them at top volume - he was walking out  _ again, of course! _

Robbie lost his temper -  _ he had his damn phone and wasn’t leaving the planet! _

_ This time!   _

Robbie finally just grabbed his stuff and walked out, carefully  _ not  _ slamming the door.  He didn’t know what else to do.  He  _ had  _ to go, ever since he’d seen Daisy’s video, the Rider was agitated and restless - there was no way it would let him stay here, even if Robbie wanted to.  

Robbie’s mouth was tight when he came over to Daisy, knowing she’d heard everything, probably the whole block had.   _ “Vamonos.” _

“So, Gabe’s the real hot head in the family, huh?”  Daisy was clearly scrambling for something to say besides ‘how’s the weather’ after listening to Robbie’s telenovela drama.

He couldn’t hold back a snort of rueful laughter.  “Kinda really is, actually. He’s got fire inside that he didn’t have to pay the devil for.”

“Mmmhm - I knew you were a big softie,” Daisy’s expression lightened a bit, though the shadows in her eyes were still there.  Things had happened while he was gone and she had new secrets in her eyes. Robbie got that, he had secrets of his own. But Daisy wasn’t here to cry on his shoulder and he wasn’t good at that stuff anyway.  He could step up in other ways, help figure out this ... whatever it was that she’d stumbled into.

And, it was the Devil - Gabe’s Good Samaritan - she’d found.  He’d never imagined he’d see him again, had assumed that the Rider who’d saved them from Robbie’s boneheaded stupidity (for a high fucking price), was the same one inside him now.  Looked like he’d been wrong. The Rider simmered in the back of his mind, urging him to  _ move _ , to  _ act _ , to find the offender and dish out some punishment.  Whatever was going on, the Rider didn’t like it at all.

Robbie watched Daisy fumble her phone out, eyes narrowing.  Had she fucked up her arms again? He thought she took pills for that or something.  “Wait - uh, no  _ chica  _ we are  _ not  _ taking Uber.”

“Yeah?  Well it’s a hike to the quinjet and you’d have to just leave your car.”

Robbie flicked his keys and grinned.  “C’mon. Don’t worry about Lucy. No one’s gonna bother her.”

“Figures you’d name your  _ car _ ,” Daisy shook her head.  “But Lucy?”

“Ah, you drove her, you know she’s got heart.”  Robbie said, climbing in and starting up while Daisy settled in the passenger side.  “And it’s Lucifer, unless she likes you.”

“Guess she likes me then,” Daisy gave the car an extra pat as she shut the door.  Robbie bit back his smile. He couldn’t deny it, even with all that he’d been through, his car was his soft spot and it was ... nice to see Daisy giving Lucy a little love too.

SHIELDs invisible jet had picked Barnsdall Park to hide in plain sight, with the city spread out below the hill and a school class traipsing through the famous blocky building that was the reason for the park’s existence.  Robbie left his car in the parking lot, tucking his keys away and smiling at Daisy's raised brow. “People forget she’s there when they walk away and no one can move her unless she wants to go.”

“I did.”

Robbie nodded. “Like I said, she likes you.”

The jet made it across the country in less than an hour.  Daisy sat next to him but fell asleep almost as soon as she planted her butt in the seat and Robbie didn’t bug her.  Instead he glared at anyone who walked by on whatever task they had on this thing, daring them to cross him and wake her up.

She looked exhausted and ... worn down in a way Robbie couldn’t put a name to, though it twigged something familiar.  When he found his mind wandering back to the horrible time in Hell, he recognized what he saw. Loss and grief and too many terrible things all at once to even think about.  Hell. He saw that in the shadows under her eyes, and the way she huddled around her own left arm in her sleep. What had happened?

He’d only been home a couple of months and some things were ... difficult.  Holding conversations. Remembering to eat. Getting angry without committing murder.  Robbie had just started to settle into being  _ alive  _ and  _ real  _ and  _ here  _ again ... and now the Rider was burning under his skin, and his struggles for control seemed so fragile.  Robbie had hoped for a little more time. Daisy twitched and gasped herself awake, blinking blearily.

“No worries,  _ chica _ ,” he murmured.  “Go back to sleep.”

She shook her head, pushing her hair out of her face.  “No. I’m awake.” She shuffled past and Robbie heard the rattle of a pill bottle before she shut the door to the miniscule bathroom and struggled for something to say when she came back.

“So, uh -”

Daisy started at the same time.

After a few rounds of ‘you go first’, Daisy plowed on.  “Was it better? The second time going ... away?”

Robbie sighed and looked out at the grey clouds, there was no sun to see, or land.  “I guess. I mean, I knew I could come back that time around.” He shrugged. “Still ended up touring the crappiest places.  What about you? SHIELD still doing its thing? You guys have been in the news. Saving the world and all.”

“Toured some crappy places, too.”  But that was all she said, leaving Robbie with nothing much to go on. Except the  _ way  _ she didn’t say anything more and this time he didn’t think she was guilt tripping herself, there was a hard tuck at the corner of her mouth that seemed angry.

Anything else was cut off by the jet angling down for a landing.  Invisibility had advantages and the jet landed on one of the hospital’s emergency helipads.

“Orderly,” Robbie sighed as Daisy shoved a handful of polyblend at him.  He shucked off his jacket and dumped it on his seat. “Surprise, surprise.”

“Hey,” She shrugged on her own disguise.  “Me too. We’re here to steal a patient, not play doctor.  Let’s just make this easy and quick. And  _ quiet _ .”

They were as invisible as the jet in the hallways, a couple of orderlies shuffling along with a gurney like extras in a hospital show.  They weren’t the only ones, though, a man and woman were pushing a gurney ahead of them and around a corner.  The patient in their bed didn’t look in good shape but _did_ look exactly like the image on SHIELD’s pad.

“Heads up, Daisy.  We ain’t the first.”

“Hey,” Daisy abandoned the gurney to give chase.  “ _ Hey!  _  That’s  _ our  _ patient!”

Robbie ran after her, barreling around the corner and prepping for an ambush.  He wasn’t wrong. The two fake orderlies were waiting, but Daisy was  _ running up the wall _ , leveraging the grip one of the goons had on her arm to throw the man down with a fierce shout.  She was  _ amazing.   _ Robbie got punched in the face for his distraction.  

“Bastard!” Robbie threw a punch of his own, following up with a shove to get some space, wincing as the woman stumbled into the gurney but the skeletal patient remained motionless and, so far, safe.  His next attack was smacked aside with unexpected strength as the woman rushed him. Her face twisted into a monstrous  _ snarl  _ that had Robbie ducking but she grabbed him and flung him into a cabinet.  Pill bottles scattered, crunching underfoot. Daisy was still fighting, the wall at Robbie’s back trembled.

The woman backed off and Robbie squared up for another round.  “Come on!” He snarled, smoke rising from his clenched fists. But the woman slapped at the glossy fitness tracker on her wrist instead.  Orange sigils burned as much  _ behind  _ his eyes as in front, tearing a hole in the world.  The Rider rushed up from his bones, shoving Robbie aside - but not fast enough.  The sigils summoned something so intense, so primal, it barely took form before rushing to attack.  Razor sharp teeth tore into existence, the shadow of a massive black hound following with a snarl as bestial as the woman’s.  It was on him before Robbie had a chance to do more than throw an arm up in last ditch, desperate defense. His scream became the Rider’s as those supernatural teeth tore, impossibly, into flame and bone.

_ “Robbie!” _ Daisy yelled and the floor rolled under the Rider’s feet.  Her power threw everyone down and, sliding across the hospital floor in a tangle of fire and shadow, the Rider punched at the Hound with burning fists.  Alarms and screams surrounded them.

Daisy’s opponent had called up his own monster; a crooked old woman, cloaked in green plaid and clutching a bloody rags.  The stink of rot and water suddenly filled the air. Daisy stumbled to a confused halt as the old woman raised her head, mouth sagging open to reveal crooked teeth and the stump of a tongue then the creature  _ keened _ .

The awful sound was every lonely death imaginable; the stumble of a last heartbeat, the choking fight for one more breath.  It echoed down the hospital halls, stealing the strength from patients, making a surgeon’s hands tremble in despair. Even the Rider paused, glimpsing the moment when its eternal Hellfire finally burned out.  Eventually, even Vengeance dies.

Still screaming her awful despair, the spirit stumbled forward, dripping hands outstretched.  Deceptively awkward, it was in front of Daisy in the blink of a weary eye, ragged nails clawing at her face.  Daisy’s reflexes took over. She flung out her arms and the whole hospital shook, walls cracking, chairs and gurneys, patients and terrified security all thrown aside by her powers.  The old woman was thrown halfway down the hallway. The awful screaming never stopped as if the ghostly woman didn’t need to breathe. She rushed back to battle, inhumanly swift.

Caught in a tangle with two chairs and the patient they’d all come to steal, the Rider and the Hound fought.  Shadow and flame, dripping teeth and empty eyes burning with hellfire, they scrabbled and screamed and tore at each other.  The woman was linked to the Hound; snarling when it did, shrieking when the Rider landed a blow but she wasn’t  _ part  _ of it, like Robbie.  She was another opponent, a trained fighter, and not afraid of the Ghost Rider like she should be.  Daisy was outnumbered too, fighting both the ghost woman and her summoner. The shrieking desolation dulled the Rider’s fire, and it was bowled down by the Hound.  Teeth snapped alongside the Rider’s skull, tearing at Hellfire like flesh.

Robbie threw his will behind the Rider’s giving him all his strength and they fought back to their feet and finally got ahold of the Hound, a crushing  _ burning  _ grip.  Scrabbling wildly at the Rider, it’s howels rose desperately as its claws tore at Hellfire but the Rider ignored the attacks, fiercely triumphant.  The woman crawled away from the fight, whining in shared pain, but struggling to her feet and fleeing while the Rider burned the Hound to smoke and ashes.  When the Rider threw the remains aside to bellow in victory, the woman had disappeared and her partner with her, fleeing while Daisy was fighting off the spectral woman, until - abruptly - it winked out of existence mid blow.

The Rider shrieked in frustration - a terrible cry of its own - and would have given chase but Robbie managed to pull it to a halt, fighting his way back into control.  

“Robbie!” Daisy was shouting, hand outstretched but not quite willing to grab hold, guttering flames reflected in her eyes.  “We have to go!  _ Robbie!” _

Robbie swung around, flesh crawling painfully back over his bones.  “What about -”

“Leave them!” Daisy said, skidding to her knees beside the tangle of bones and withered flesh that was their target.   “Help me with ... with  _ him _ .”

Robbie cast a glance at the dessicated body - not dead but not really alive - then slung it impatiently over his shoulder, over Daisy’s protests.  “Look, if he was gonna die, it’d have happened already. We gotta go, right?”

Daisy looked wildly along the hallway, there were alarms everywhere and the terrorized security was gaining courage.  Bent and broken hospital equipment was scattered across the buckled hallway. “Yeah -  _ dammit -  _ this was supposed to be quiet _ , _ c’mon.”

They pelted back the way they’d come, Daisy panting instructions into her comm.  The jet was back on the roof by the time they got there and they sprinted for the bay, barely ahead of the hospital’s security and the police they’d called for back-up.  Robbie put the guy they’d ... stolen? Kidnapped? ... into a seat where it sprawled like a broken marionnette and stumbled to a seat of his own as the jet rocketed into the air.

“Wow, he really does look like crap.” Robbie rubbed his hands on his jeans, grimacing as he imagined shreds of that dried flesh sticking to his hands.  Still he leaned closer, fascinated. Dried and dying or whatever - this was the first time he’d seen anyone like  _ him  _ \- another Rider.  Robbie touched the back of the man’s hand, where tendons were drawn tight under papery, flaking skin.  Robbie strained to feel anything, the heat, the fire that burned even now in his own body. There was ... nothing.  More than nothing, there was a hollow emptiness where there should be  _ something  _ \- a spirit, a soul - whatever the Rider sensed when it judged the guilty.  Robbie sat back with an uneasy scowl. He’d never felt -  _ they’d  _ never felt - something alive but empty like that.

Daisy was watching him, gaze measuring and worried, with a bloody towel pressed to her chin.  Bruises were blooming on her knuckles and vivid black eye darkened her skin. Robbie bit back a scowl, obscurely guilty for his own unblemished flesh.  But, he wouldn’t wish the Rider on anyone, healing or no.

“Is it - he - like you?”

Robbie shrugged.  “Dunno. There’s ... nothing.  Like,  _ really  _ nothing.  It’s ... messed up.”

“Okay,” Daisy leaned back with a shrug of her own, then a wince as she pulled at her cuts.  She gingerly adjusted her towel. “Maybe Jemma can figure something out.”

Robbie figited.  “You okay? How long ‘till we get to your base or whatever?”

Daisy pulled away the towel and let a fresh - but slow - trickle of blood free for a moment before putting pressure back on it.  “I’ll be fine. We’re not far. Just a bit north of here and ... in the middle of nowhere.”

“Yeah,” Robbie jerked his chin at her.  “Where's the first aid kit? I can slap a bandaid on with the best of ‘em.”

Her brows rose in slight surprise but she let him fetch the kit and fish around until he found a gauze pad and some tape.  Robbie managed to get the pad on the awkward angle of chin and jaw but it wasn’t a pretty sight. Daisy touched the crumpled gauze gingerly. “I think you overestimated your bandaging skills.”

“Hey,” Robbie protested, “I didn’t tape your mouth shut.”

Daisy’s mouth quirked, then she winced when it pulled at her cut.  “Not  _ this  _ time.”

Robbie hung his head with an awkward half-laugh.  He remembered his jangling nerves back then, his hands had been shaking when he’d tied her up.  No one had ever found him out before and he hadn’t known what the hell to do. “Sorry. But you were getting all in my business. For no reason.”

“Well, I didn’t know that, then.”  Daisy said. “I mean, you were kinda  _ slaughtering  _ people.”

“Who  _ deserved  _ it,” He said stubbornly.

“I didn’t know that either.”  Daisy leaned back in her seat, sighing and shaking her head, smile dropping away.  “It was a long time ago.”

Robbie rubbed his face.  “Yeah, it was.”


End file.
